Wednesday, October 14, 2009

A short walk from such places as the Empire State Building ( entrance shown with tourists flocking around)-- and Grand Central area, these buildings also are good for public transportation.

Apartments in these buildings vary...I have been in the building in the center here ( 40 Park Avenue) and was surprised on smallish nature of living quarters...it is a great looking building though...bet the top floors have big penthouse like apartments.

Air quality is a problem for people who are sensitive to city pollution I guess. Suppose you can always buy an expensive air filtration system...

Lots of shops and restaurants around but is something of a hike to nearest supermarket ( at 32nd and 3rd)...not that bad, really.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

The Marble Collegiate Church at Fifth Avenue and 28th Street is famed as the home of Norman Vincent Peale...

Peale, if you are too young to remember, was a wildly successful motivational speaker who encouraged "The Power of Positive Thinking," and was part of the official optimism of the country during the 50's and 60's and even later.

His book sales were enormous as he urged people to positively think their way to success...in a world and country where all things were obtainable.

Now the church's gate in front is draped with "Peace Ribbons" commemorating military people fallen in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as prayers for peace in general.

The recession has hit hard and everyone knows it will take some time to emerge from it. But, on a deeper level, have Americans lost their traditional faith in the inevitable success of America?

Surely, there is no lack of immigrants who are searching for the "American Dream." And Obama's slogan of "Yes We Can" seemed to be a great protestation of faith in America's potential.

But you sense really negative undercurrents these days which contradict that American Dream idea. ( I remember one scene from an episode of "The Sopranos" where a Russian mob--related woman says to Tony Soprano, " Americans always act so surprised when things don't turn out for the best. In the rest of the world, people expect the worst, and they are usually not disappointed."

Noticed on my walk around Midtown the other day that new buildings are still being put up, and in the beautiful autumn sunshine the City looked so pleasant and appealing...

But New York has certain advantages other places do not. Consider the plight of Detroit or Newark. Does anyone really expect life there to realize the American Dream?

And the ravings on the Right get more and more strident and doom laden.

Finally, there is another big scare about the world coming to an end in 2012 (supposedly because of Mayan calendars ending then and some super-rare convergence of stars)-- there will even be a much ballyhooed motion picture about it.

Somehow, as during Vietnam, America isn't a very confident country these days and it looks like it's going to take a long time for that to change.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

I left after the first third of "The Invention of Lying" and I don't really care what I missed...

Not in the mood for this movie today. It has one basic comic idea--the invention of lying in a world where lying is unknown-- and that's pretty much it.

Having people blurt out all their thoughts and feelings uncensored all the time gets to be boring. As someone has pointed out, no world could really exist if people did that. It would cause too much social disruption.

White lies are a kind of social glue found the world over and we can't do without them.

I had heard bad things about this movie but wanted to see for myself. If I had been in a more tolerant mood, I would have stayed for the whole movie-- there are chuckles here and there.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Living among skyscrapers becomes second nature if you live in the inner part of New York or Chicago...

But, interesting as it may be to a tourist, you get fairly jaded about it as a resident.

There is one immense apartment building, about 50 stories tall, across the park from where I live...

At night you see scores (hundreds?) of lit apartments, and it suddenly dawns on you again that each one of them represents a home, a life, somebody.

Meanwhile, on the street, you just dodge traffic and other pedestrians and silently curse the ones who cut you off on the sidewalk or who stop abruptly without warning right in front of you... all this congestion makes me long for Cape Cod again!

About Me

New Trier High School, Winnetka Illinois.... cancer survivor...NYU Grad School of Film and TV...Film Editor....Training Audio/Visual Writer for US Coast Guard...audio visual producer and public relations writer..had some pretty awful bumps along the way (haven't we all) --glad to still be around and in touch with so many friends from the past